My Songs of the Year 2011

Seasonal joy ... here for your delectation is my very own pick of the pops for 2011. I will say right here that I forgot to include the rather brilliant Jens Lekman and Friends (I'm his girl) singles both of which just came out. Apart from that, this little lot are my special little musical pals for this year. Merry Christmas to you xxx David

David's songs of the year 2011 by Lightspeed Future Lullaby

1. Burial - Street Halo - Street Halo EP - UK
Burial has a "trademark sound", but like Boards of Canada before him, it is seminal, unique, much mimicked and never equalled. SONG OF THE YEAR.

2. Beirut - The Rip Tide - The Rip Tide - US
A welcome return for one of the truly great bands to emerge in the last decade. Hard to choose one track from the album, but this mournful title track edges it just. ALBUM OF THE YEAR.

3. Deerhoof - Super Duper Rescue Heads! - Deerhoof vs Evil - US
My daughter sings this - to my delight. Deerhoof continue to make skewed left-field pop with addictive hooks.

4. The Advisory Circle - As the Crow Flies - As the Crow Flies - UK
The prolific Jon Brooks in his AC guise on the ever-wonderful Ghost Box label (almost album of the year).

5. Zomby - Natalia's Song - Dedication - UK
Haunting standout from his first album on 4AD, featuring Zomby hallmarks like the wild time signature shifts but distilled down into a melodic tour de force.

6. Twin Sister - Kimmi in a Rice Field - In Heaven - US
Amongst the very very best of the recent crop of US bands filtering 80s influences into modern synthpop.

7. Connan Mockasin - Faking Jazz Together - Please Turn Me Into the Snat - NZ
Often called whimsical, this lovely fella from NZ via Elephant and Castle is just plain unique.

8. Balam Acab - See Birds (Moon) - See Birds - US
Spacious electronica with a dubby feel, from US sample wunderkind.

9. Metronomy - The Look - The English Riviera -UK
Perfect synth-pop originating from the unlikely environs of Totnes Devon.

10. Jon Brooks - Wandur Weltzeit - Music for Deiter Rams - UK
A musical tribute to Deiter Rams, designer of the Braun AB-30 alarm clock, from which all the sounds on this track are drawn.

11. The Field - It's up there - Looping State of Mind - DE
I think the album title says it all. A perfect example of the art of repetition.

12. Panda Bear - Surfers Hymn - Tomboy - US
The solo spinoffs from Animal Collective continue to thrill.

13. Rustie - Globes - Glass Swords - UK
It's prog Jim but not as we know it. An album from a dubstep hero that has divided opinion.

14. Tennis - Marathon - Cape Dory - US
A song that makes me want to be in the song. Very evocative.

15. Walls - Heat Haze - Coracle - UK
Label-mates and soul-mates of The Field. More repetitive bliss.

16. The Mummers - Call Me a Rainbow - Mink Hollow Road - UK
Lavishly orchestrated but still plaintively-beautiful song-craft.

17. PJ Harvey - On Battleship Hill - Let England Shake - UK
I think...my favourite ever PJ Harvey song!

18. Washed Out - A Dedication - Within and Without - US
An artist fast out-growing the "chill-wave" (hypnagogic was such a better name for it) micro-genre which has informed a lot of US indie since 2008. Reckon he'll last.

A Christmas single by me

"Now it's Christmas" is a "Christmas single" - if you click through on the link below you can buy it and all proceeds go to Oxfam so please please be so kind. It's only a quid. See it as my version of getting sponsorship for running a marathon!!

Inspired by Ze's brilliant Xmas album from 1981 this comes in at the more wide-eyed and bushy-tailed end of the Xmas spectrum. Just a plain ole sentimental "want you back" love song.

Written and produced by David Griffiths with substantial input from Bryn and Cat (Sonic Magpie) - to whom many thanks.

Cruel by St Vincent

Now then, this is promising for her new album coming very soon.

The Wild Swans at the Thekla Bristol Thurs 9th June 2011

Perhaps it's best to start with the days immediately following this gig. Wild Swans’ songs flew around my head like flocking starlings and my Google search history was littered with Swans-related search terms. So it was good - really good. Let's make that clear from the start.

Now, back to the moments just before the show. As someone who tends to shy away from reformed bands from the distant past (especially ones I love, like this one) it was fair to say I was sceptical about going to see the Wild Swans, a legendary band that shone brightly (but briefly) in the famous Liverpool scene of the late 70s and 80s. Paul Simpson, the leader of the band, was central in that scene but like the Wild Swans is perhaps less well known than some of his contemporaries (Julian Cope, Ian McCulloch, Pete Wylie, Bill Drummond to name but a few). Maybe that's why Simpson is calling the reconvening of the band "unfinished business" rather than a reunion. He has a point. One brilliant release in 1982 (a single, "The Revolutionary Spirit") was scant evidence of their stature in that bygone Mersey melting pot. But then if you are only going to release one single, making a stone-cold classic and releasing it on one of the coolest labels of the day (Zoo) will do you no harm in achieving almost mythical status in subsequent years. To an extent that is the position the Wild Swans have occupied all these years, as stars that burned brightly and exploded before any reputation could be sullied. A quintessential cult band; this despite reforming once already in the late 80s when they released 2 albums, the excellent and ethereal "Bringing Home the Ashes" (1988) and "Space Flower" (1990). In between the two Swans incarnations, Simpson made some lovely music with Care (another overlooked band) along with Ian Broudie, later of the Lightning Seeds.

Now fast forward to 2011 and Simpson's "unfinished business" has yielded a rather fine new album ("The Coldest Winter for 100 Years") and a fine band to play it (and lots of the older stuff) at the Thekla, Bristol's famous venue-on-a-ship (one of a handful of dates on a UK tour). Thekla Thursday gigs mean an extremely early start (because the venue hosts a club night from 10pm) so support act Stealing Sheep duly convened on stage at precisely 7.30 to a slightly sparse audience. This three-girl act (also from Liverpool) were a really nice surprise with a sound best described as the Andrews Sisters singing Warpaint, or putting it more literally, the sweetest close harmonies hung around minimalist alt-rock atmospherics. Their melodies were never obvious and always engaging. One to keep an eye on.

By the time the Wild Swans took the stage the audience had filled out somewhat but it should be noted that there was fierce competition in town as the hugely in-vogue Pains of Being Pure at Heart and a reformed Erasure were both playing within a stone's throw of this venue on the same night. I was glad to see that it was not made up solely of "men of a certain age"  - often the case at such reformations. Maybe this was a function of that hyper-cult status the band enjoyed; cudos certainly thrives in the thin upper-air where music obsessives of all ages choose and hang on to their heroes.

The first thing I noticed about the group was that Simpson himself was looking very debonair and well suited to front a band who had obviously been instructed to "look sharp". And look sharp they did. But more importantly it was clear from the first song onwards that they sounded sharp too. As a statement of future intent (as opposed to past glories) they opened with "Falling To Bits", a song from the new album, then quickly followed it with a great rendition of "Bible Dreams" from "Bringing Home the Ashes". There was always something swashbuckling and grandiose about the Wild Swans at their best and the fact that that opening song from the new album sat so joyously next to an "old classic" from the first album says a lot for a band that immediately seemed comfortable and confident in their own sound. This set the pattern for the rest of the show, a great mix of old and new songs, which hung together seamlessly. Simpson, slightly nervous at first (at least between songs), grew in stature and poise as the show proceeded and the performance was met with warm enthusiasm from the crowd. The stellar band - Les Pattinson (Echo and the Bunnymen), Mike Mooney (Spiritualised), Ricky Maymi (Brian Jonestown Massacre), Richard Turvey and Stuart Mann (drafted in at the last minute but still superb) - played brilliantly and despite the "names" there was no showboating. The stage was very much Simpson's, just as it should have been, and although Raymi made some amusing interjections once in a while, this seemed only to reinforce the sense of "groupness" about them rather than the opposite.

Of course they closed the set proper with "The Revolutionary Spirit". How could they not! It is one of those inherently climactic songs and, as if it was needed, it reminded everyone of why this band were so fondly remembered and why they deserved that "legend" status all those years. But more importantly, the rest of the set was validation of the Wild Swans as a force in the here and now. A chance for Paul Simpson to begin to realise something he started so long ago. Not so much mission accomplished as "game on".

Set list:
Falling To Bits
Bible Dreams
Archangels
Liquid Mercury
Immaculate
When Time Stood Still
The Bluebell Wood
In Secret
Chloroform
Underwater
Now And Forever
God Forbid
No Bleeding
Bringing Home The Ashes
Revolutionary Spirit

Encore: Tangerine Temple

Such a tragic loss - Trish Keenan R.I.P

I was absolutely desolate when I heard the shocking news yesterday (via a Facebook post) that Trish Keenan of Broadcast had died of pneumonia (possibly complicated by H1N1 influenza). Broadcast began in Birmingham in the mid nineties (where they remained until recently relocating to Hungerford). As a fringe member of the Brum scene of that era, our paths crossed and her death has certainly resonated more because of this "mutual friends" aspect (but also because she was a young healthy woman taken so early). But ultimately I just became a real admirer of the band, which over the years evolved into an essential "lynch-pin"  in the cannon of experimental pop: one of those bands that defines a sound (or perhaps more an aesthetic in Broadcast's case). Their approach (and appeal) can almost be summarised in the title of their first full album, "The Noise Made by People". Broadcast were about more than just melody (though they had great melodies); noise, or sound of noise really, was essential too. The way they fused all that was their great strength. Trish was one of the two core members of the band (along with husband James Cargill) and her voice (icy and warm in equal measure) was its most defining characteristic. She sounded beautiful and looked beautiful (and very cool). Broadcast were the real thing. You only had to follow their extra-curricular activities to get a sense of how immersed in the exploration of sound and music they must have been. Various playlists and mixes were published on their website over the years, each of which was a route map to strange and exotic musical discoveries. In that sense the band name was so appropriate: Broadcast were ultimately like a TV channel; purveyors but also collators and curators: broadcasting fantastic stuff. They joined so many dots. It is to their absolute credit that their own releases (four proper albums and lots of singles which got gathered on two compilations) will surely be remembered as amongst the most essential and enduring releases on the left-field of pop.  The link below is to the video of "Come on let's go" (from "The Noise Made by People"), one of my favourite songs. Trish you will be sorely missed - R.I.P.  My deep sympathies and condolences to her husband, family and friends.